This and that

So many things going through my mind today. I received an email, written late at night, from an extended family member who was reflecting on the pain of saying good bye to a much-beloved dog yesterday. Ironically, he and his son came to our house in early June and comforted me when I'd just run over my much-beloved Labrador Ebbie. So, my heart goes out this morning to Chris, Judy and Jeremy.

The next thing I learned this morning was the identity of two of three suspects charged in the murder down the road. In one case, I know the person. I had him as a student back in the '70s and even taught his daughter who's a phenomenal young lady. I know the family well and their hard-working mother who drove school bus forever. This suspect even worked for a time right in our neighborhood and graduated with my sister from Sandpoint High School in 1978.

I never would have believed this young man capable of such a horrific act. Probably most startling in my thoughts today is the realization, which is still sinking in, that this was one of our own. We speculated all week about who would do this, and, in the same breath, lamented about "what has happened to our town with all this influx of population."

All this influx of population apparently had no impact on this crime. It was locals inflicting harm on locals. And, it apparently involved another cancerous entity that's been hanging around here so insidiously, doing dirt to people's lives for more three decades now. Once again, the sinister element of drugs appears to be an accomplice to the horror that happened almost in our back yard Saturday night. In the past year, participation in the drug scene had another of our locals locked up after he allegedly threatened to kill someone.

It's a sad state of affairs that so many people have been so adversely affected by this particular crime---families, friends, colleagues, neighbors----all touched by a single act, all never to be the same again, all never to feel the same again about trust. And, it's especially sad, as in so many cases, that at the core of this tragedy lurks the villainous element of the drug culture. We have been shaken here in Sandpoint, and I'm confident we will be even more shaken when the community learns that the alleged perpetrators grew up here.

Not a lot of good thoughts to start the day except to know that our local law enforcement has not wasted a minute this week in their search for these suspects. I appreciate their efforts as I'm sure everyone in the community does.

Hats off to the Sandpoint police and their investigative team.